RPG rules out celltel pullout plans
Calcutta: Following intense media speculation that the RPG group would sell out to the Tata-Birla combine in respect its two cellular businesses -- RPG Cellular Services Ltd (RCSL) in Chennai and RPG Cellcom Ltd (RCL) in Madhya Pradesh -- the Rs 6400-crore Rama Prasad Goenka (RPG) group announced yesterday that it had no intention to pull out of cellular business. According to the spokesman of the group it considers the cellular business as one of the group's core areas of operations.

In a press release by the group, it was clarified that cellular services are an integral part of the group’s plan to be an important player in the retailing, information technology, communications and entertainment.
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Zee postpones ADR plans
Bangalore: The country’s fastest growing media company, Zee Telefilms, which had sought all permissions from its shareholders and the government for the issue of $1.5 billion of ADR’s, has announced that it has shelved the proposed issue for the moment. This was announced by the media company’s chairman, Mr. Subash Chandra. The chairman also stated that it was not sure as to when the issue would actually be made.

New York Stock Exchange chairman Richard Grasso announced at a press conference in May that Zee would list its proposed ADR on the NYSE.

Zee officials had said the proceeds from the ADR issue would be used to invest in new media activities, acquire content and to boost its distribution network.
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Satyam strikes alliance with Exterprise
Mumbai: Chennai-based Satyam Computer Services is reported to have struck a marketing and training alliance with the US-based Exterprise for marketing e-market solutions to traditional businesses and dotcom companies round the world.

ActiveMarket, Exterprise's flagship collaboration software platform, enables companies to build dynamic market places in conjunction with trading partners and buying communities on the internet. The alliance with Satyam envisages the setting up of training centres in the North American, Asia Pacific and European regions to train sales force for ActiveMarket and deploy joint marketing and sale programmes worldwide.
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Reliance to invest Rs 525cr in Karnataka
Bangalore: The Reliance group, which has recently made significant forays into the information technology and communications sector, is said to be investing Rs 525 crore to lay a 3,000-km-long fibre optic network in Karnataka.

An agreement to this effect was signed recently with the Karnataka government, under which the group will also set up 7,500 computer information kiosks in the state.
According to government sources, the company is also planning to invest Rs 1,615 crore in developing a information technology park in India's technology capital in Bangalore. The proposed park would be built on an area of 70 acres of land and include 4.25 million square feet of office space.
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Indal will continue to operate as separate entity
Calcutta: The Aditya Birla-group, Hindalco Industries Ltd. (Hindalco), which has taken over the former multinational company, Indian Aluminium (Indal), has decided to allow Indal to operate as a separate corporate entity to ensure that its working culture does not get disturbed with the end of the direct association with Alcan Aluminium Company of Canada.

A senior Hindalco official reiterated that the Birla group does not want to make any significant change in the corporate structure of Indal after taking over the management and that there is no need for any merger. According to the official, Indal will continue to operate as a wholly-owned subsidiary of Hindalco. He, however, indicated that the board of directors of Indal would be reconstituted after all necessary approvals for the take over have been received.
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UB shelves plans to push beer brands into China Bangalore: Learning from the reversals suffered by many multinational beer companies, which have already commenced operations in China, Bangalore-based United Breweries Ltd. has shelved its plans to push its beer brands into that country.

UB Global Corporation, the international business division of the Indian alcoholic beverage major, has been testing the water for a possible foray into the Chinese market, touted as the largest potential beer market in the world. However, the beer industry in China, they said, was highly fragmented and most beer companies were unable to mop up a viable slice of the market share to sustain their operations in that country.

Kingfisher, UB's flagship beer brand, is available in 40 countries around the world including major beer markets like Australia, New Zealand, Japan, US, Singapore, Hongkong, Canada and West Asia. It is now considered the fastest growing beer brand in the UK.
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Thomson group picks up Primark for $842 million
Toronto: Canada’s largest publishing group, the Toronto-based Thomson group, which recently entered the realms of electronic publishing and information services, moved a step closer to achieving its goals when it took over US-based financial information publisher, Primark, in an all cash $842-million takeover deal. This take over will help the $5 billion group expand its presence in the software and content services field, besides giving it a tight grip on the financial forecasting business in North America.

The deal, which is expected to close in the second half of this year, envisages Thomson taking over $235 million of Primark debt.

With Primark's focus being almost 85 per cent electronically-based and another 8 per cent internet-based, the acquisition is seen as an ideal fit for Thomson's electronic-publishing strategies.
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Microsoft may get a breather
Washington: In a move that could give the beleaguered software giant, Microsoft Corporation, some breathing space, the US government has accepted some of the suggestions offered by the software major to alter a proposal to break up the company. The government has agreed to characterise the break-up as a "divestiture" rather than a "reorganisation."

It is understood that although Microsoft offered significant changes to the proposal, the government agreed to only minor alterations. The government is said to have rejected a majority of the changes suggested by the company on the grounds that "they would undermine or frustrate the purpose and effectiveness" of its proposed remedy to break up the company.
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Schwab launches wireless trading
San Francisco: The world’s largest online broking company, Charles Schwab & Co., announced that it has launched online trading services over wireless devices, in alliance with Aether Systems Inc., a wireless data products and services company. The service, PocketBroker, will allow the brokerage’s customers to make trades and receive news initially through hand-held digital organisers made by Palm Inc..

This move just increases the trading venues for the brokerage, whose clients can buy and sell stocks on their computers, through retail branches, by e-mail and over the phone.

According to company sources, the wireless medium offers customers the ability to receive real-time market alerts and current news -- wherever they are -- and, if they chose, act on this information regardless of their ability to access a branch, phone or PC.

The service includes access to real-time quotes, market summaries, news headlines, equity trading and confirmation, order status, account balances and positions, real-time alerts, full news stories and watch lists.
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Sega and Motorola plan joint program to develop cellphones to access internet
Tokyo: The world’s third-largest video-game console maker, Sega Enterprises, announced that it has agreed with Motorola Inc to jointly develop new cellular phones that can access the internet.

The two companies will develop new software allowing mobile phones to hook up to the internet and process data at high speeds with technology now used in Sega’s Dreamcast home game machine that has internet functionality.

The two companies are planning to launch the cellphone globally in the spring of 2001. The new phone will be able to download games and video images as well as other forms of data from the internet.

This move by Sega reflects a bid by the troubled company to diversify beyond video games to revive profits that have been squeezed by tough competition.
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